30 Days of Blogging

I’ve written years’ worth of travel notes that are now lost, scattered across broken hard drives and scrawled in notebooks covered in tea stains, stuffed down the sides of beds in countries I no longer live in. And while I can happily write 3,000 word articles in a client’s name, self-consciousness has left me too afraid to publish my own personal thoughts. Sometimes I feel lifeless as a fly in amber.

No more. I’ll be publishing my own notes and stories over the next 30 days.

After all, in the words of Murakami, “In a hundred years everybody here, me included, will have disappeared from the face of the earth and turned to ashes and dust.” So what’s the point in being shy, right?

Putting things down on paper, entering them on the keyboard, seeing them on the screen: these are all easy. The most difficult step is pressing that “post” or “submit” button. I love trains, particularly the Bahn’s ICE network with which I’m sure you’re very familiar. 😉 My latest post started out about the thrill of the ICE, but the words took a life of their own, a darker edge. I was reminded (again) that the trip, the journey is as important as the destinations or endpoints that I’m constantly missing the country, through all the ups and downs, the positives and negatives. Ultimately, I was honest with myself, and I’m happy about that, even if the words I wrote are a little opaque. I look forward to reading more about your notes and thoughts, Alisa.